(The most recent items are first)

January 3rd, 2005: This morning I was awoken with breaking news: Dad was being moved to University of Maryland, and not Deaton. The problem was that around 2am his trach started having him bleed a lot and CHC could not fix it and moved him to UMD. So they had to send the police around 3am to our house just to tell us to answer the phone because we were sleeping. When I went in there a few hours ago, they did not reinsert the trach. Instead, he's back on the ventilator and sedated, in Critical Condition. If your in Baltimore and want to go see him, go to UMD in Downtown Baltimore, 4th floor and just ask for Jack Chalker.

January 1st, 2005: This is going to be the final news post on www.JackChalker.com unless a big emergency or something really exciting happens. Mom & I came up with an idea if you want to help instead of donating. You can contribute a present or a get well card to:

The Mirage Press
P.O. Box 1689
Westminster, MD 21158-1689

I've also removed the live conditions thing because for the past 10 days now he has been Stable and looks like the rest of this month it will still be Stable. For all Dad's update, please visit Jack Chalker's Wife's Blog or My blog. �Felices fiestas! (P.S. I did not take German [or... Latin?]. I got that line from Babel Fish.) 

December 30th, 2004: I don't know how to start off, but Dad is going from Carroll Hospital Center to University Speciality(? [which was formerly Deaton]). The doctors expect him to be out of the nursing home in several months, and his car is being sold. (I get dibs on his cell phone! No, just kidding.) I know that Dad's book, Chameleon, will not be published, however that could be proved wrong. We are also moving to a one-story house with no stairs for Jack's comfort. So, just a summary: He is permanently disabled but not fully retired. However I think Chameleon might be cancelled and his latest book published will be his last published. Care to sign the guestbook?  

December 18th, 2004: Click here to donate to the Chalker Family Emergency Fund 

December 15th, 2004: Jack is awake! (Click here to learn more) 

December 10th, 2004: How Jack Chalker's Surgery Went, and Click here if you still want to leave Jack a "Get Well Message", because Mom or Dave is reading all of them (except mine) tomorrow at 12pm. Please do it before 11:45am EST, thank you! 

December 9th, 2004: Taken from Mom's (Eva Whitley) LiveJournal:

We went in to visit Jack today and talk to the doctor about the trach. (This would be doctor number 4, in as many days.) This guy was very optimistic. Basically, if we agree to the trach, it would NOT be permanent, it could be pulled out when Jack was better, Jack might be transferred to a nursing home about 15 miles away but it would be a short-term thing and he'd be coming home. The gastric bypass surgery could wait until Jack is recovered and could give his consent and it would be his decision at that point. I am more wildly optimistic at this point than I have been in days, I feel like I have been given a great gift. We also had a consultation with the hospital social worker who had information for use on the choices in nursing homes for post-op trach weaning, a range of services for Jack (physical therapy, occupational therapy, maybe even counseling) to help him. There are risks to the surgery, but then I had similar risks when I had my hysterectomy last year and that went swimmingly. (In at 6 am Monday, out by 2 pm on Wednesday, I could have stayed another day but ugh! ick! hospitals!) 

The surgery is tomorrow morning at 11AM so keep your prayers/good wishes/thoughts coming!

December 7th, 2004, some important information: This is not Jack Chalker, this is his son Steven. Dad has had problems lately with his leg and yesterday he went into the hospital. This evening Mom (Eva Whitley) and me went into his room and he was sleeping. He is in Fair Condition according to the nurse, but I have bad news: He has congested heart failure. His heartbeat has been moderating between 50 bpm and 90 bpm but mostly in between 50 and 65. This does mean that his new book will be delayed but I have the feeling he will not die. Everyday I will be updating his condition and keep you posted. Click here to leave a "Get Well Soon" message/comment for Jack and I'll see to it he'll get all the messages from his fans. I've already got two.

July 29, 2004: Now you see why I don't do a blog. They'd throw me out for inactivity. I'm spending from now through the end of August finishing a book that's long overdue so I can go to the World SF Convention in Boston with a relatively clear conscience. Health wire, I've been better but I'm getting older, and I really think I don't have a lot of problems that winning the lottery and losing 90 pounds wouldn't go a lot to curing.

     Those who know me and those who have followed my comments here and elsewhere probably know that I'd love to spend some time here commenting on politics, but until I get ahead on my other writing there's only a little that I can spare the time to cover. I do note that I was pretty well right on Iraq, and I have no idea how the heck the folks in Washington are going to get us out now that they've gotten us in and used up the entire army (I sure hope we don't need them elsewhere), blown up the place, caused over 900 casualties of some of our best and brightest young people and permanently crippled over 3000 more with no end in sight (and let's not even discuss how many "liberated" Iraqis are going) while making us hated and reviled even in countries that are our theoretical friends. I can understand attacking those who attack you, but we get created by folks in Afghanistan and we respond by declaring war on Iraq? Sure, Saddam was a Hitler-like scuzzball, but I'm afraid he wasn't alone in this and in fact he was a good buddy of Bush Sr. and Dick Cheney until he misunderstood some signals and attacked oil supplies in Kuwait. And Osama was a good guy to the Reaganites so long as our mutual enemy was the USSR. So while Iraq is a crippled hole, Iran is building nuclear bombs, North Korea has both the bombs and the missles, and we're slammed by the Wassabis in exile in Afghanistan and so we attack Iraq? Uh huh. All because the neocons in Washington have this weird theory of how to make the world in our image in a view as rigid and as wrong as the old communists. In fact, they remind me of that mind-set; every time the world view is proven wrong, you just come up with an alternate universe that says it's not really wrong. In the meantime, it's not their kids who die. Like Cheney in the Vietnam era, they have "better things to do." Those who have followed me all these years know I can respect conservatives, liberals, you name it, but I can't abide hypocrites.

     So, see why I haven't done much here with this? Remember, I had a heart attack last year. I need to keep things from blowing up inside.

     But I have a prediction. We are not only not safer than we were before this war, we're in a much more dangerous position. We are already giving up our liberties in the name of security, and we'll have neither. And, at this point, it won't matter who wins in November....

      And the worst part is, I haven't been wrong on this stuff yet.

      See you in Boston, or here when something awful happens or the book is done.

March 31, 2004: Yes, you're right, it's been a very long time since I updated this site, but in addition to the health problems is that I have lost two to three months and I haven't been able to recover them no matter how hard I try. I need to catch up on all my business activities, my commitments, and my family, and I have to do that while somehow finally getting through the overdue books and starting new projects. You can understand that this means that I've wound up having to prioritize just about all I do, and updating the web site isn't something that comes near the top of the list no matter how much I want to do it.

     And yet between the previous entry here and this one I have gone to several conventions, including one in Burbank, California, have, alas, gone to at least one major funeral of an old friend of many decades, playing computer mechanic, internet guru, and Dad to not only Steve, my youngest son, but also Dave again, who is back from Ohio and again living in house while trying to work off his bills and get finished with college while Eva is full time with Lockheed Martin, if not quite Rosie the Riveter but at least Rosie the Microsoft Office guru for those folks who do the Medicare and Medicaid stuff for your federal government. She is also vice chair of this year's Balticon, the Baltimore SF Convention over Memorial Day weekend, which also makes her the chair of said con in 2005.

     I think I'm finally at the point where, if nothing else goes wrong, I may actually be able to finish Chemeleon in April and start on one or two other projects as well. At this point, the writing comes first. I need to refill the money coffers bad.

     Locally, our little Pekingese who inexplicably ran away in September is vanished for good, and Steve insisted on getting a new dog for him. He picked one, all right, and it really is his dog, but it's a hound, much larger than any dog we've had here and larger than any dog I've ever had except my first one when I was a kid, which takes some getting used to. As to what kind it is, well, it's a hound and I mean all hound, although probably of several types in one. He looks pretty much like a cross between a beagle and a foxhound, and he has a fear of being left alone and insists on being around one or another of us. He came from a rescue shelter so he already had a name we're saddled with because he knows and answers to it. So, we have a dog named Boomer. The tomcat, by the way, has already taught Boomer who's boss here. And I guess I must mention Ixty, the third pet, which is Dave's—and, from the name, you might guess that it's a very large female iguana. It's in a huge terraformed cage, which protects her from the cat, but I do think Ixty is lonely and always planning for a breakout. We'll see.

     Well, it's spring, everybody's home and reasonably healthy, the weather's breaking and I'm back at work, so maybe, just maybe, we can get a break. Don't expect me to update too frequently, but I'm going to try and get back at least to my habit of appending things here once a month whether there's anything to say or not, and at any time when there's breaking news. Until I write more and catch up, though, that news is going to be more folksy than professional unless Hollywood finally decides to make one of those movies. --jlc

October 23, 2003: Yes, it's been a while since these pages were updated, but that's due to a lot of things happening within the past couple of months. I'll try and bring you briefly up to date.

     Through August, 2003, things were pretty normal, if hectic. Eva had a serious operation and had to take off work for a long recovery, but somehow Lockheed Martin still launched everybody's Medicare and Medicaid so the world was safe, even though it meant I was basically doing all the housework as well as trying to work as much as possible. Mark Owings and I managed to get over to Horrorfind and talk with the horror small press folks, but otherwise it was a hot and wet but routine August. At the end of it, Eva, Steve, and I packed into the car and drove north to Toronto for the World Science Fiction Convention. It was a typical worldcon, the 38th that I've attended, and it was great talking with readers, fans, and old friends and colleagues. During this time, however, my long term physical problems with breathing and energy had been increasing, but one of those rent a scooters gave me full freedom. I'd been trying to find the cause of the problems for a year and a half and had been in and out of outpatient testing trying to find the cause and get help, but up to that point nobody had found any cause that showed up long enough to say, "Aha! That's it!" I was beginning to think that I was just going to have to learn to live with it.

     We also had a bizarre return. Our little dog, Mavra Chang, was picked up at the kennel but when brought home she ran off into the farms beyond like a shot. It was the last time we saw here after 15+ years and cast a real pall on the homecoming. She certainly wouldn't have lived too much longer, but this remains a shock and inexplicable.

     By early September Steve was back in school, Eva was back at work, and I was back working on Chemeleon, but that wasn't to last. I was still drained in energy. In mid-September one of the nastiest hurricanes in recent decades roared up the boast, and we began to board up the place and hold tight. They almost always miss us, but every once in a while they don't, and this one was to be one of the worst. This one was so mean that, for the only time in my memory, they announced that schools would close early the day it was due in order to insure that everybody could get home.

     That morning, I woke up to go to the bathroom, went into the bath off the bedroom, and the next thing I knew I was lying on the bathroom floor, unable to get up, my speech slurred, totally confused and with hallucinogenic flashes. After all sorts of attempts at getting anywhere, even sitting up, I knew I just had to hold on. Steve was due in early from school, and although I had no idea what time it was I knew it was in the morning and that meant he'd have to arrive soon. Eva was at work and I had no way to communicate with anybody. It was certainly a shock for a 12 year old to come home and find his father in such a condition, but Steve called 911 and then his mother, and within several minutes I was being loaded into an ambulance. Whatever they did brought back feelings of normalcy and control and the ability to speak clearly, and soon I was being wheeled directly into Emergency. The ER physician on duty happened to be one who knew me (he had been in Seattle SF fandom while growing up) and I was in the hands of experts poking, probing, analyzing, etc. very quickly. He also called in a top cardiologist who in turn called in a lung man just on his way out to beat the hurricaine. Together they were able to establish that I had suffered a heart attack with blockages in three of the four main passages. The cardiology OR at the county hospital was shut down–not enough experts with the storm coming–so they transferred me to Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, which is next to Pimlico race track and not far from where I grew up, and by late night I was having two primary stints installed and a third cleaned out. It was now clear to one and all that I had actually had a small attack almost two years earlier and that this was the cause of my earlier problems; this one was considerably meaner. The burden lifted off me by the heart surgery is dramatic, although getting some energy back is slow and must be done carefully. I am also currently on 15 pills a day (no kidding) and carry nitro with me at all times. Recovery is noticeable but very slow, so if you see me at a con and I'm tired out, you know why. Still, I made it to World Fantasy Con and will hopefully make it to Loscon if they get me plane tickets, and I'm due for a couple more yet (see Conventions) so we'll see. In the meantime, bear with these pages if they are not updated quickly or completely. Lots of work, so little energy and no time to make up the losses....

     So, that's why I've been way behind (2004 may be the first year since 1981 with no new book, but I am back working) and why even the internet pages haven't been updated. At the moment, if all goes well, I still intend to be at Conclave in DC in mid-November at least for a day or so, Loscon in LA around Thansgiving weekend, as well as Philcon, and I'll also be in Indianapolis for a new con in mid-January 2004, but cross your fingers. Once you've had an attack like this, nothing's ever confident again.... jlc